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Delta Green handler advice
I’m going to run Delta Green for the second time tomorrow and I’m excited! However, I’m looking for some tips on running a session and/or your favorite scenarios to run. What are your thoughts?
I ran a Cthulhu/Delta Green campaign.
The best place to look for inspiration would be The X-Files, which inspired Delta Green itself. A lot of mystery and conspiracy. It must be a story of investigation, where the players peel multiple layers of reality. The horror must be infrequent, often more suggested than overt. Let the dread naturally sink in. Don't push it.
I recommend having at least one character that is an investigator, FBI agent, Delta Green agent, or official investigator of some kind. And they must have a strong reason to continue investigating, otherwise they'd just say "fuck this, I don't wanna die".
This is a game of smarts, psychology, and social skills. Combat is possible, but it is rarely how situations are resolved. Players must understand that this is not a comedy otherwise the atmosphere is gone. Actions must be realistic to the characters, and have serious consequences. Including death, insanity, or incapacitation.
This is still a Call of Cthulhu universe. Winning doesn't mean ending the evil, at the most you'll postpone the inevitable. And a lot will be lost along way.
Consider placing your campaign in the 90s US to add to the atmosphere. Maybe that's because I love The X-Files so much, but I can't imagine Delta Green anywhere but the United States.
My campaign was very X-Files, involving cults, aliens, and government conspiracy.
Old Call of Cthulhu and Delta Green adventure/campaign books were my main sources. I recommend looking through some CoC RPG books for monsters, entities and lore. You can easily find all of those online, for purchase or otherwise, and everything can be easily adapted to a modern setting.
Edit: real world cults, myths, and other bizarre stuff are also a great source of inspiration. Things like MKULTRA, urban legends, etc. For example, what if there were some truth to the beliefs of the Heaven's Gate cult?. Also: the SCP Foundation.
I’ve actually never seen X-Files! I did watch Archive 81 a while back, which was great, and recommended as being based on the Night Floors scenario.
If you want, you can watch a few episodes of X-Files to get the mood. Look for a list with the best episodes, they are largely standalone so you don't need to watch it all to understand. It will be helpful for you to understand the tone Delta Green is going for. Also, read the Night Floors scenario. It's pretty great!
First, watch yourself some x-files. I know it is on disney+.
I also wanted to mention that if you like the Archive 81 show then you should check out the podcast. The first season is a lot more of the same, though different style and focus.
I ran this mini campaign 1 2 3 a couple of years back. It was pretty high lethality but it was a good time! The only agent to make it to the last mission was a heroin addict by the end who finally snapped and tried to murder the other agents and was thrown off of a hot air balloon into the roiling seas of Carcosa.
As Lou already suggested The X-Files is a great place for some inspiration, it's a fantastic show anyway (my personal favourite of all time) and will give you lots of great ideas.
I've got a friend who picked up Delta Green and tried to run it and it was okay, he just went for straight horror, no build up of dread or tension, just scary monsters. I highly suggested he watch the X-Files and we've played a Delta Green one shot since and you can definitely feel that he's pulling from the X-Files now and the game was stronger for it. The epitome of show don't tell.
Aside from the X-Files I'd also suggest a podcast called The Magnus Archives. It's a rather scary horror podcast based around a new head archivist for The Magnus Institute in London, an academic institution dedicated to documenting the esoteric and paranormal, recording audio files of historic statements for backup. There's five seasons, each episode is 10-20 minutes long and I can highly suggest it. Unbelievable that such high quality storytelling is free.
There's a group on YouTube called Glass Cannon that plays a lot of Delta Green. I believe they're on Season 4 now. They have always been a great inspiration and the first that my Handler recommended to me when I asked for Delta Green related content to learn how to play. I would give that a watch if you have the time. It's lengthy, an episode is 2ish hours but well worth it. Can always watch in a podcast like format as well since it doesn't really require the visuals of a video.
I did reflect on my recent sessions due to this post and I honestly think setting the atmosphere is a very underrated way to add tension to the game. Describe what time period your in, maybe who's president or my personal favorite touch is when your players are in a car tell them a song is on from the time period and then as background noise play the song. It was my favorite small detail my DM did and really made me immersed. Whatever you do it, do it 110% and you'll have fun.
I love Get in the Trunk! I'm currently on season 2; it's amazing.
I've run DG twice now (different groups), and I think both times went pretty well, though it's hard to really get into character progression when it's only a one-shot. In the last game, one of the players knew it was psychological horror, but I think they weren't prepared to kill/sacrifice a kid (Operation FULMINATE) and it tainted their experience.
I ran a game once using Gumshoe rules for Fall of Delta Green, it's setting specific to the 60s I believe. Gumshoe is a great system for running investigative games because it changes how you think about skill checks and you don't run into the issue so much of people failing skill checks and losing out on vital information (depending on how you were handling that before). If you have a vital clue, just give it to the players if they ask about it or if they're close to it, don't make them roll a skill check for it, because they will fail and then you'll be screwed trying to figure out how to get the players back on track.
Misdirection can lead to some interesting scenarios where the players are convinced that an NPC is up to something, they don't know what it is, but they know something isn't right, and so they start digging a little bit more. Then they make a discovery, that, while unexpected, doesn't actually solve the mystery, but it's an interesting discovery in and of itself.
One of the greatest moments I've had the pleasure to GM for occurred during this Delta Green game when the players were convinced that the local sheriff was hiding something in the shooting death of a drugged-up hippie guy (sheriff was on leave pending the investigation). It was pretty apparent that the sheriff had let himself go and was borderline alcoholic at this point, but he had a letter from the US Govt just sitting on a pile of letters on his dining room table. The PCs were convinced it meant something, so they swiped it. After they got outside with the letter and started reading through it, they realized that the man's son had been killed in Vietnam and realized that that's what may have been behind his behavior (in addition to his daughter running off with a cult). Within a few seconds of reading the contents of the letter, there was this "Oh shit" moment where everyone realized they were completely wrong about this guy, and it was beautiful when it happened. I don't think I've ran anything that's topped that moment before.
If it's everyone's first time playing, I highly recommend the shotgun scenario Burner. It goes from 0-100 very quick, and doesn't really give players a chance to 'check out' like a longer form investigation can do. Get the players hooked with Burner, then drop something a little longer-form and investigative on them. I do have some assets saved from running this in Foundry maybe a year ago. I'd be happy to share if interested, just PM me!